Developed countries take ______ of the world’s health expense.

Inequality of health care is still paramount, says the WHO’s latest report. Indttstrialized countries account for less than 20 percent of the world’ s population but take 90 percent of health spending. In Japan more than five hundred dollars is spent on drugs per person per year. This compares to just three dollars in Sierra Leone. Only slightly more is spent in many sub-Saharan countries. Over the last fifty years, life expectancy has in- creased globally from forty six years to sixty five. But today, instead of the gap being between the developed and developing countries, it’s now biggest between the very poorest nations and all other countries. The bur- den of infectious diseases, including HIV, as well as chronic conditions, coupled with a lack of health care, has led to this situation. However, it’s children who are most affected. Almost fifty seven million people died in 2002, nearly twenty percent children of less than 5 years of age, and ninety eight percent of these deaths occurred in developing countries.